Rhode Island League of Girls Clubs records

The Rhode Island League of Girls Clubs was an association of girls clubs headquartered at 183 Weybosset Street in Downtown Providence. Its constituents included the Girls’ City Club of Providence formed in 1920, the Valley Girls’ Club based in Warwick, and other clubs across Rhode Island. These girls clubs were formed to provide social, recreational, and learning opportunities for young women. Some of these clubs held membership policies which included a minimum membership age of 17, and legal conditions of being unmarried and never divorced.

The Rhode Island League of Girls Clubs was a chapter of the National League of Girls Clubs, originally named the National League of Working Women. Established in 1897, the National League of Working Women was intended to connect local clubs that provided social, recreational, and learning opportunities to young women around and above the age of 16 employed in industrial jobs. Correspondingly, the Rhode Island League of Girls Clubs was previously known as the Rhode Island Association of Working Women’s Clubs, and was a member association of the National League of Women Workers. Some girls clubs that constituted the Rhode Island League of Girls Clubs, such as the Valley Girls’ Club, were a part of the National League in its original iteration.

The National League’s focus on working women deescalated, and in 1920, it was renamed the National League of Girls Clubs. Correspondingly, the Rhode Island Association of Working Women’s Clubs became the Rhode Island League of Girls Clubs. As the National League of Girls Club, the National League served its original connective function and also acted as a sponsor for speakers’ programs, vacation camps, and excursions to womens’ colleges that were made available to local girls clubs. Local clubs voted among themselves to become part of the national association, and needed to be self-governing, apolitical, non-sectarian, and financially self-supporting in order to join.

The National League of Girls Clubs disbanded in 1930, although girls clubs that were a part of the National League did not necessarily disband. In periods of war that include World War II and the Vietnam War, girls clubs which constituted the Rhode Island League of Girls Clubs took up a commitment to providing social and entertainment opportunities for military men, ranging from dances to letter-exchange programs. This was carried over from the association’s first iteration as the National League of Working Women, when it provided these same programs for military men during World War I.

Following a decrease in membership as well as urban beautification plans in downtown Providence which slated girls clubs’ headquarters for demolition, some Rhode Island girls clubs such as the Girls' City Club began to dissolve in the 1970s. The dissolution of both the National League of Girls Clubs and many of its local constituents took place amid the growth of the Young Women’s Christian Association as a primary national association that provided social and recreational opportunities for young women.